Joel and FRED are No Match for Cyber Crimes

Joel spent the week of February 11-15 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in an intensive, unique training experience. Upon completion he became certified to provide forensic evidence related to computer use.

As Worth County's Information Technology Director, Joel was instrumental in bringing this digital forensics effort to the county. When law enforcement agencies have to send computers to be examined to the Department of Criminal Investigation, some cases can take more than a year to process. By performing similar investigations at the local level, catching criminals can be expedited--particularly criminals who commit cyber crimes or who leave digital evidence of their crimes.

As part of the training, Joel had to learn the hardware and software used for this kind of evidence collection. The FRED (Forensic Recovery Evidence Device) is a computer workstation that connects to any digital device and reads the information without affecting what is on the hard drive--something that would not be possible by simply turning on and examining a computer.

Entire hard drives are copied onto FRED. From there a special software program is used to search through the information looking for specific types of computer files such as images, web mail, documents and more. These tools also allow for searching digital cameras, mp3 players, memory cards, and cell phones.

Joel has already been called upon to assist in a couple of child pornography cases; and most recently was called in on an area school district case involving a bomb threat sent via email. Joel was able to assist the police in making an arrest by tracking down the computer that was used to send the email as well as identifying the user.

In the near future, as this resource becomes more widely known, Joel expects he and FRED may get involved in other cases such as identity theft and embezzling. In the meantime, Joel was just elected vice president of the Iowa Counties Information Technology (ICIT) group which meets several times a year to discuss technology concerns within the Iowa counties' government offices. This group also organizes events and exercises designed to simulate emergencies and test disaster preparedness plans.